A Ride for Liberty Print by Eastman Johnson
$69.00 at Brooklyn Museum.
Fine art print
In this composition, Eastman Johnson portrayed an enslaved family charging for the safety of Union lines in the dull light of dawn. The absence of white figures in this liberation subject makes it virtually unique in art of the period—these African Americans are independent agents of their own freedom. Johnson claimed to have based the painting on an actual event he witnessed near the Manassas, Virginia, battlefield on March 2, 1862, just days before the Confederate stronghold was ceded to Union forces.